To the Virgins, Make Much of Time
Robert Herrick (1591 - 1674 )

Gather ye rosebuds while ye may,
Old time is still a-flying,
And this same flower that smiles today,
To-morrow will be dying.
The glorious lamp of heaven, the sun,
The higher he's a-getting,
The sooner will his race be run,
And nearer he's to setting.
That age is best which is the first,
When youth and blood are warmer;
But being spent, the worse and worst
Times still succeed the former.
Then be not coy, but use your time,
and while ye may, go marry;
For having lost just once your prime,
You may for ever tarry.


We don't read and write poetry because it's cute. We read and write poetry because we are members of the human race. And the human race is filled with passion. And medicine, law, business, engineering, these are noble pursuits and necessary to sustain life. But poetry, beauty, romance, love, these are what we stay alive for.
--- Dead Poets' Society

I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived. I did not wish to live what was not life, living is so dear; nor did I wish to practise resignation, unless it was quite necessary. I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life, to live so sturdily and Spartan-like as to put to rout all that was not life, to cut a broad swath and shave close, to drive life into a corner, and reduce it to its lowest terms, and, if it proved to be mean, why then to get the whole and genuine meanness of it, and publish its meanness to the world; or if it were sublime, to know it by experience, and be able to give a true account of it in my next excursion.
--- Thoreau

I sound my barbaric YAWP from the rooftops of the world.
--Walt Witman

O to struggle against great odds,
To meet enemies undaunted.

To be a sailor of the world
Bound for all ports

O I live to be the ruler of life
Not a slave

To mount the scaffolds
To advance to the mussels of guns
With perfect nonchalance

To dance,
Clap hands,
Exault,
Shout,
Skip,
Roll on,
Float on

O to have life
henceforth the poem of new joys

To indeed be a god!
--- the boys of Old Poets' Society

I close my eyes,
and this image floats beside me:
a sweaty-toothed madman
with a stare that pounds my brain.
His hands reach out and choke me
and all the time he's mumbling,
mumbling truth
like a blanket that always leaves your feet cold.
You push it, stretch it,
but it'll never be enough.
You kick at it, beat it,
it'll never cover any of us
from the moment we enter crying
to the moment we leave dying
it'll only cover your face
as you wail and cry and scream.
---Todd Anderson

Laughing, crying, tumbling, mumbling,
gotta do more, gotta be more.
Chaos screaming, chaos dreaming,
gotta do more, gotta be more!
---the 'chant'

Mr. Pitts - Taking his time, he knew he would get there one day.
Mr. Cameron - You could see him thinking, is this right, it might be right, it might be right, maybe, no, I don't know.
Mr. Overstreet - Driven by a deeper force.

The difficulty of maintaining your own beliefs in the face of others.
We all have a great need for acceptance,
but you must trust that your beliefs are unique, your own.
Some people may think them odd or unpopular.

Robert Frost said: Two paths diverged into the wood,
and I, I took the one less traveled by,
and that has made all the difference.
--- demonstrating Conformity